Saturday, August 28, 2010

[Alt: Ever notice how the more successful observational comics become, the more their jokes focus on flying and hotels?]

Ugh. What a sad little comic on which to end my week of guest posting. Here we have what open mic night would be like in the wacky world of xkcd. Each panel serves as its own little mini-joke, and the alt-text is an observational joke about observational comics. Hee hee! How meta!

None of these jokes are particularly amusing. The first panel is essentially "lol, aphasics can't speak correctly." As much as I love making fun of people with disabilities, just pointing out that they're incapable of doing something isn't enough to make a joke for me. YMMV.

The second panel is the evil Mr. Hat. He launches into a joke that one expects to be a typical "yo momma so fat" snap, but ends up being what I assume is supposed to be a biting insult about how yo momma wishes she never had you. Oh, how you cut to the core of me, Mr. Hat. I liked you a lot better when you were cutting improperly parked cars in half. At least then you were moderately clever.

The third panel is... OMG OMG OMG A COMPUTER SCIENCE REFERENCE *nerdgasm* Okay, now I need to go smoke a cigarette. Well, except that it's not exactly an accurate reference to a quine, but that's only something a super pedantic Aspie would say, right? B- for effort, I guess.

The last panel is Mr. Beret saying something idiotic that I guess is supposed to be something wacky and out-there. Oh, Mr. Beret, I liked you a lot better when you were giving woodpeckers power drills. At least then you were somewhat cute.

Hey, ever notice how the more successful nerd comics get, the more their jokes reference a shoehorned compsci concept?

Anyway, thanks for tolerating my presence this week. I wish I could have finished on a much higher note, but this comic was seriously the textbook definition of "meh."

Considering randy's level of maturity and joke-telling ability I was honestly a bit surprised to not see an MC Tourette's joke in there.However the continued destruction of Beret's character more than makes up for that pleasant surprise.

ok, first off, who came up with this site? It's completely pathetic.I mean, your entire site is based on making fun of a rather cool comic. You know, most people are actually intellegent enough to add content of their own. You should try it sometime. Also, I've read most of the Xkcd comics, and they're a lot better than anything you could come up with. Personally, I think you are just one sad dude who has no friends and no life.

ok, first off, who came up with this site? It's completely pathetic.I mean, your entire site is based on making fun of a rather cool comic. You know, most people are actually intellegent enough to add content of their own. You should try it sometime. Also, I've read most of the Xkcd comics, and they're a lot better than anything you could come up with. Personally, I think you are just one sad dude who has no friends and no life.

ok, first off, who came up with this site? It's completely pathetic.I mean, your entire site is based on making fun of a rather cool comic. You know, most people are actually intellegent enough to add content of their own. You should try it sometime. Also, I've read most of the Xkcd comics, and they're a lot better than anything you could come up with. Personally, I think you are just one sad dude who has no friends and no life.

ok, first off, who came up with this penis? It's completely pathetic.I mean, your entire penis is based on making fun of a rather cool blow job. You know, most people are actually horny enough to add cock of their own. You should try fellatio sometime. Also, I've read most of the Xkcd comics, and they're a lot better than anything you could come on my face. Personally, I think you are just one sad dude who has no friends and a large cock.

Let's play Count the Rants!Everyone see how many overused questions that Rob has made rants about Valkyrie is using.I'm thinking #'s 1, 3, and 4 of Rob's rants are there for sure, and possibly 2 is implied.

ok, first off, who came up with homosexuality? It's completely arousing.I mean, my entire sexual attraction is based on making love to dudes. You know, most people are actually intellegent enough to get a man of their own. You should try it sometime. Also, I've sucked most of the cocks in this town, and they're a lot better than anything you could come up with. Personally, I think you are just one sad dude who has no friends and no life.

ok, first off, who came up with NUCLEAR WARFARE? It's completely pathetic.I mean, your entire FOREIGN POLICY is based on making fun of a rather cool COUNTRY. You know, most people are actually intellegent enough to add NUCLEAR WEAPONS of their own. You should try it sometime. Also, I've read most of the NUCLEAR WARFARE BOOKS ABOUT NUCLEAR WARFAR, and they're a lot better than anything you could come up with. Personally, I think you are just one sad WORLD LEADER who has no friends and no NUCLEAR WEAPONS.

ok, first off, who came up with this retard? It's completely pathetic.I mean, your entire life is based on whacking off to a rather awful stickfigure comic. You know, most people are actually intellegent enough to think for themselves. You should try it sometime. Also, I've read most of your copycat posts, and they're a lot better than anything you could come up with. Personally, I think you are just one sad dude who has no friends and no life.

ok, first off, who came up with this comment? It's completely pathetic.I mean, your entire comment is based on making fun of a rather cool language. You know, most people are actually intellegent enough to spell intelligent correctly. You should try it sometime. Also, I've read most of your comments, and they're a lot better than anything Randall Munroe could come up with. Personally, I think you are just one sad dude who has no friends and no life.

ok, first off, who came up with this universe? It's completely pathetic.I mean, your entire lifetime is based on being born, reproducing and then dying. You know, most people are actually intellegent enough to transcend physical mortality. You should try it sometime. Also, I've read most of the Xkcd comics, and they're a lot better than anything you could come up with. Personally, I think you are just one sad God who has no friends and no life.

@Ves: Patton Oswalt is often the one exception to just about anything.

@R.: Refresh my memory on Dr. Horrible, as I think he was before my time. I seem to recall that he was one of the people who had an online conversation with Randall about this site. What constituted his fall?

@Aloria: Excellent final post. The panel-by-panel breakdown seems to be your forte. Well played.

I'm 24 and after a shitty breakup went from 180 to 166 pounds. i've stopped losing weight but i am still a little flabby. how can i harden up my mid section. crunches seem to be working only real slow and really it's not that much. i drink a lot of beer. is my only option to quit all the booze. i do lots of running. 4 miles 5 times a week. any suggestions on how to stop this plateau i've hit and get a little more hard/lean?

ok, first off, who came up with this meme? It's completely pathetic.I mean, your entire meme is based on making fun of a stupid troll comment. You know, most people are actually intellegent enough to think up jokes of their own. You should try it sometime. Also, I've read most of the memes on the internet, and they're a lot better than anything you could come up with. Personally, I think you are just one sad dude who has no friends and no life.

@NIP: Clearly, all the audience noticed that Black Hat Man was Black Hat Man and, remembering that they were in XKCD, decided there wasn't much point hanging around and all popped to the bar. BHM makes his opening joke, viz. "Yo momma's so fat when she sits around the house she really sits around the house", and is just about to begin his second when the echo of the first one reaches him and, in a vain attempt to delude himself that there is an audience out there, he construes it as a heckle.

Yo, I'm M.C. valkyrie and I'm here to say ok, first off, who came up with this site? It's completely pathetic.I mean, your entire site is based on making fun of a rather cool comic. You know, most people are actually intellegent enough to add content of their own. You should try it sometime. Also, I've read most of the Xkcd comics, and they're a lot better than anything you could come up with. Personally, I think you are just one sad dude who has no friends and no life.

I'm MC valkyrie and I'm here to say ok, first off, who came up with this site? It's completely pathetic.I mean, your entire site is based on making fun of a rather cool comic. You know, most people are actually intellegent enough to add content of their own. You should try it sometime. Also, I've read most of the Xkcd comics, and they're a lot better than anything you could come up with. Personally, I think you are just one sad dude who has no friends and no life.

No, see, this WAS Randy's attempt to use his established characters in a humorous way, at least for two of the panels. It's just that he no longer seems to realize what the characters' defining (or, more importantly, funny) traits used to be, so this comic falls completely flat.

You know, if this is Randall's attempt to utilize established character, then we can safely assume that this means all vague female characters in the Xkcd universe have hilarious and mockable disabilities, and all vague male characters make incorrect references to stuff people don't care about.

I'm MC valkyrie and i'm here to stay. What was the fucking meme again? You shouldn't criticize xkdc the way you criticize it because anyone who is intelligent enough knows it is good. You are sad, dude. Very sad. Dude.

@Ves: for some reason, it's the mournful-sounding "Would you like some ice cream?" that always cracks me up.

I agree, though--partially. I think the success of that bit is the fact that his humor is based on trenchant criticism rather than tired reference.

It does remind me, though, of a conversation I had with a friend about Star Wars (long before I'd heard of Patton Oswalt). He said something along the lines of "The problem is, George Lucas didn't really go into much detail about blah blah blabby blah" (I wasn't paying very close attention). After they were done, I said "You had me at 'The problem is George Lucas.' "

ok, first off, who came up with this site? It's completely awesome.I mean, your entire site is based on making fun of a rather shitty comic. You know, most people are actually intellegent enough to post content of their own. You do try it all the time. Also, I've read most of the Xkcd comics, and they're a lot worse than anything you could come up with. Personally, I think you are just one awesome dude who has many friends and a life.

see these lazy-ass references are lazy joke material. XKCD would have been much funnier if it'd pulled apart all these observational humour jokes rather than just becoming them

like, I'll tell you what the problem is with airline food- believe it or not this HIGHLY ADVANCED PIECE OF TECHNOLOGY designed to fly you across international distances at unforeseen speeds was not designed with fitting a cook, and a kitchen IN MIND.

you can't even have MICROWAVES on a fucking plane, you short-sighted moron- if YOU don't like re-heated mashed potatoes and freeze dried fish, then peel your flabby-arse off of your extra legroom seat and get to solving it!

I guess he hasn't heard about all the shit going on with NASA and Obamaspace at the moment, or he wouldn't be quite so excited about it. The phrase "if one of Earth's cultures advances its space program enough" has never been less likely than right now.

So I have to get out of bed to get excited about how great it's going to be for people in a couple of generations? That's like those people who, when something major happens in the news, sit up all night staring at the television even though there are frequently NO NEW DEVELOPMENTS for twelve hours straight and it's basically all just people standing around gossiping.

holy tits did 786 suck. randy's carpe diem strips are always terrible, but of all the reasons to pick from, choosing something that won't happen within our lifetimes has to be the dumbest. "Get up, the universe is going to end in billions of years! HURRY!"Who gives a flying fuck if they perfect that kind of travel multiple generations from now?Ugh. It's one thing to make a lame carpe diem, it's quite another to actually fail to make one at all. randy discovered a new low.

I genuinely don't know what Randall is trying to do with 786. I mean, usually I can see what he's trying to do, and why he failed to actually do it. But this...

I mean. What? Is this another of his bullshit "seize the day by acting as whacky as possible" sermons? Because if so, it's nonsensical. Or is it intentionally nonsensical, due to the nature of Beret Man's alleged humour? In which case, it's unfunny.

There was an earlier comic with some talk between an axiological nihilist and beret person, who agreed with the assertions made by the former. That more or less makes them both philosophically categorized as "existentialists" as far as the term can be applied to living people and not as a purely historical categorization.

I think it's more of an "it sure is an exciting time with all these new scientific discoveries! Think of the possibilities!" thing. Or something.

It reminds me of the ending of Star Trek First Contact where Picard and Lily have the following exchange just after the titular first contact was made and Picard prepares to go back to the future:Lily: "I envy you, the world you're going to."Picard: "I envy *you*, taking these first steps into a new frontier."

I'm guessing Randall was going for the same sentiment that Picard was expressing there. With the key difference that I actually like First Contact.

Yeah, I was about to post a similar comment to Bizmit. And of course, by "was about to post" I mean "am still going to post because I want you to see how mine is slightly differently-worded."

But yeah, it starts with Mr. Beret talking about how we are alive during a potentially historically significant time! That IS exciting, I am on board! So what does that mean, Mr. Beret? Are you going to talk about how we should appreciate the times we're living in? Or make a joke about how we should really focus on our academic work because it could end up being important? I mean these are kind of lame, but I'm intrigued to see why you're so excited to tell us this, and this is more than I can say for most XKCD comics.

.........Oh. "Come on!"

"Come on!"?

What the shit?

Come on, and...what? Why are you saying this, Mr. Beret? What do you want the guy in bed to DO, why are you waking him up? Are you just so overcome with emotion that you want to go run around outside or something? What does "Come on!" mean? ELABORATE, OR ELSE THERE IS NO JOKE HERE!

Admittedly, the alt-text clarifies it a little bit, and I do think it's kind of funny, but then that really should have been the punchline.

He's saying you should contribute to society by advancing scientific and humanistic values through the application of human ingenuity.

Or, you know, write a webcomic. Whatever work you can get, I guess.

Maybe Randall sees himself as a sort of Peter Keating figure - he wants the world to exist along a Randian Great-Person utopia but the only thing he can do is vaguely panegyrize human achievement because the universe has not seen fit to give him the ability to actually participate in it.

I've always noticed that objectivists I've met are, to a one, of the opinion that they personally belong to that prime-mover class of being. I wonder what happens to people who think Rand is right but also have low self-esteem? The world may never know.

very, very awkward phrasing throughout, an issue which is further exacerbated by the way that the text is squeezed into a small column in one frame. "and if one of earth's cultures advanes its space program enough to start enriching uranium on asteroids..." uggh! this guy sounds as though he is from an exoplanet. would it kill Munroe to hire an editor?

man am i tired of randalls carpe diem bullshit especially when the thing he is talking about is not anything most people have any valid reason to give a shit about as they will be long dead before it has any actual impact on society or their lives

if i were the guy in bed it would have gone something like this"i am going back to sleep and if you wake me up one more god damn time telling me to sieze the day i will gouge out your eyes with a rusty spoon some of us have actual jobs to go to and cannot afford to fritter away our time thinking about irrelevant bullshit now go back to reading wikipedia and making uninspired updates to your web comic and never ever speak to me again randall munroe"

Wow, thanks Randall. I'll be sure to tell my kids to tell their kids to tell their kids to tell their kids.

Also, after Man in Bed's nine-minute snooze, where exactly is Beret going to take him? Presumably he wants to further mankind's knowledge of enriching uranium on asteroids, so I guess that would mean hitting the library.

HES FRENCH!!!OK, so french people have baguettes...BAKERIES!UM... haven't there been some existentialists that were french? Yeah thats it, hes french therefore he likes philosophy.Ok then I dunno, he gets confused sometimes like in 785? Maybes Randull hates french people so thinks they all have sub par intelligence. BRAINFLASH! Loads of artists, writers and philosophers were french. Therefore THEY ARE NOT SCIENCE!!! So thats why he casts Beret Man as stupid.That also explains 786 cos hes french and therefore an arty guy therefore he has no grasp of the science concept that is time. He stupidly thinks that 200 years or so from now is the same as next week. What will those arts people say next?So.....Theres the comic where he can't choose a car, maybe french people have the inability to make decisions or... it could be his racism showing again.At one point he thinks too much about another guy saying stupid stuff that doesn't make any sense. More prejudice against french people being arty methinks.HEY! So it turns out its beret guy who thinks Volvo sounds like vulva. We all know the racial stereotype that the french are obsessed with sex. That explains that. Case closed.Oh wait, do french people like birds? or see birds as people that need tools? Damn.Fuck it thats enough reading xkcd to support my bullshit theory.

"The last panel is Mr. Beret saying something idiotic that I guess is supposed to be something wacky and out-there" ok butt-munch if your going to bag on someone at least know what you're talking about, don't just immediatley assume it's stupid and put it off.

What the hell is this?

Welcome. This is a website called XKCD SUCKS which is about the webcomic xkcd and why we think it sucks. My name is Carl and I used to write about it all the time, then I stopped because I went insane, and now other people write about it all the time. I forget their names. The posts still seem to be coming regularly, but many of the structural elements - like all the stuff in this lefthand pane - are a bit outdated. What can I say? Insane, etc.

I started this site because it had been clear to me for a while that xkcd is no longer a great webcomic (though it once was). Alas, many of its fans are too caught up in the faux-nerd culture that xkcd is a part of, and can't bring themselves to admit that the comic, at this point, is terrible. While I still like a new comic on occasion, I feel that more and more of them need the Iron Finger of Mockery knowingly pointed at them. This used to be called "XKCD: Overrated", but then it fell from just being overrated to being just horrible. Thus, xkcd sucks.

Here is a comic about me that Ann made. It is my favorite thing in the world.

Frequently Asked Questions

Divided into two convenient categories, based on whether you think this website

Rob's Rants

When he's not flipping a shit over prescriptivist and descriptivist uses of language, xkcdsucks' very own Rob likes writing long blocks of text about specific subjects. Here are some of his excellent refutations of common responses to this site. Think of them as a sort of in-depth FAQ, for people inclined to disagree with this site.